Hearing Secret Harmonies - Anthony Powell [64]
Delavacquerie raised his eyebrows, as if that were going to be an unpredictable undertaking. I said some of the things you say when a friend of Delavacquerie’s age announces impending marriage. He laughed, and shook his head. All the same, he seemed very pleased with the prospect. So far as I knew anything of Polly Duport, she seemed a nice girl.
‘We shall see, we shall see. That is why we are visiting the Antilles.’
During the next month or so I did not go to London. Over and above the claims of ‘work’ – put forward earlier as taking an increasing stranglehold – attention was required for various local matters; the chief of these – and most tedious – the quarry question.
One of the neighbouring quarries (not that recalling the outlines of Mr Deacon’s picture) was attempting encroachment, as mentioned earlier, in the area of The Devil’s Fingers. The matter at issue had begun with the quarrying firm (using a farmer as ‘front’, at purchase of the land) acquiring about seventy agricultural acres along the line of the ridge on which the archaeological site stood. The firm was seeking permission from the Planning Authority to extend in the direction of the monument. Among other projects, if this were allowed, was creation of a ‘tip’, for quarry waste, above the stream near The Devil’s Fingers; the waters of the brook to be channelled beneath by means of a culvert. If local opposition to workings being allowed so near the remains of the Stone Age sepulchre could be shown to be sufficiently strong, a Government Enquiry was likely to be held, to settle a matter now come to a head, after dragging on for three if not four years.
The quarry-owners were offering undertakings as to ‘landscaping’ and ‘shelter belts’, to demonstrate which an outdoor meeting had been arranged. Men carrying flags would be posted at various spots round about, indicating both the proposed extension of the workings, and related localities of tree-plantation. The assembly point for those concerned, timed at nine o’clock in the morning in order to minimize dislocation of the day’s work, was a gap in the hedge running along a side road, not far from the scene of action. A stile led across the fields to the rising ground on which The Devil’s Fingers stood, within a copse of elder trees.
‘Quite a good turnout of people,’ said Isobel. ‘I’m glad to see Mrs Salter has shown up. She won’t stand any nonsense from anyone.’
The previous night had been hot and muggy, a feeling of electricity in the atmosphere. The day, still loaded with electrical currents, warm, was uncertain in weather, bright and cloudy in patches. Cars were parked against gates, or up narrow grass lanes. All sorts were present, representatives of the quarry, officials from local authorities, members of one or two societies devoted to historical research or nature preservation, a respectable handful of private individuals, who were there only because they took an interest in the neighbourhood. Mrs Salter, noted by Isobel, was in charge of the Nature Trust. A vigorous middle-aged lady in sweater and trousers, whitehaired and weatherbeaten, she carried a specially designed pruning-hook, a badge of office from which she was never parted.
‘Who are the three by the stile?’
‘Quarry directors. Mr Aldredge and Mr Gollop. I don’t know who the midget is.’
The small energetic henchman with Mr Aldredge and Mr Gollop, almost as if he were shouting the odds, began to pour out a flow of technicalities on the subject of landscaping and arboriculture. Mr Aldredge, pinched in feature, with a pious expression, seemed at pains to prove that no mere hatred of the human race as such – so he gave the impression of feeling himself accused – caused him to pursue a policy of wholesale erosion and pollution. He denied those imputations pathetically. Mr Gollop, younger, aggressive, would have none of this need to justify himself or his firm. Instead, he spoke in a harsh rasping voice about the nation’s need for non-skid